Once there was a little girl who was very beautiful. This little girl was a princess, and her name was Hilda. Hilda had many servants in her home to do her bidding. She had two little servants to wait on her, and each of these little servants had five other little servants. These little servants were called hands and fingers.
She had two little servants to carry her everywhere she wanted to go. These were called feet. She had two little servants to see for her, called eyes, two to hear for her, called ears; one to talk for her, called tongue; and servants to chew for her, called teeth.
Hilda took great pride in keeping these little servants clean and sweet. But one day Hilda grew cross. She would not keep her little hand-servants clean, and they would not wash her little eyes, or ears, or feet, and these other little servants would not do their duty.
Soon her little teeth were dirty, for her hands gathered all the germs they could find and carried them to her pretty little mouth. Her little hand-servants would not curl her hair, which got tangled and ugly. The little teeth would not chew her food well, so Hilda had a bad night with the colic. In fact, her little servants treated Hilda so badly that her mother was afraid some wicked person had sent an evil spirit over them. I am afraid that this was true, for Hilda was cross, and sent that spell into her little servants.
Things went on this way for a whole day, when Hilda's mother decided to carry her to her Fairy Godmother, and see if she could do anything to take this evil spirit from Hilda.
Hilda's Godmother was at home. The mother told her about how things had been going. The Godmother was very sad. After talking it all over, she gave Hilda a large bundle to carry home, and told her not to open it until she reached the nursery. As soon as Hilda got to her own clean little room, she started to untie the bundle. She heard a tiny little voice, saying, "Hurry up, little Hilda, we are waiting for you." As soon as she unwrapped the first piece in the bundle, a pail of nice warm water, with sponge, soap, and towel, jumped out, and began washing her face and hands. A toothbrush jumped out, and began washing her teeth; a golden comb combed her pretty curls; a little fairy jumped out and took off her dirty dress and put a clean one on her; and another small fairy laced up her shoes, and then ran about, killing all the germs she could find.
When the fairies and all the other wonders had finished their work, Hilda was again a beautiful little girl, and more like a little princess than ever. The Fairy Godmother came into the room and stooped and kissed her.
WHAT THE FAIRIES DID FOR LITTLE HILDA
Hilda, all of a sudden, opened her eyes and saw her beautiful mother standing over her, kissing her. Hilda rubbed her eyes and found that she had been asleep.